Good evening, welcome to the June 21st Special Citizens Bond Advisory Committee, 20th, thank
you.
It's 6 p.m. and our first agenda item is consideration of the minutes for June 6th.
So any questions or comments on those meeting minutes?
Alright, would someone like to make a motion to approve?
Okay, Janet, thank you.
Second.
Second, Susan.
Any other discussion?
Alright, all in favor of approving the minutes as presented without amendment, say aye.
Aye.
Any opposed?
Same sign.
Thank you, motion carries.
Next on the agenda is our discussion on the topic of public art and we'll turn that over
to David.
Great, thank you everyone for being here this evening.
I want to point out what you have in front of you at the table to start off with.
We have a binder in front of you with all of the bond materials that have been presented
thus far and also kind of individual sheets on each one of the projects from streets to
sidewalks to public safety facilities with detailed information on each one of those
projects, information you've heard in the presentations but now you have it kind of
in a form in the binder as we move forward.
These will be, we kind of view these as living documents so each meeting that you come to
will give you the presentations to include in those in the binders, the financial information
as it gets updated will update those tabs as well so really just a good resource for
you all to keep everything together.
I'd like to thank our public affairs staff, our city manager's office staff, reprographic
staff on really working hard to get those binders ready for everyone.
Also on the two presentations we'll have tonight, just sent out a couple hours before the meeting
some revised presentations and you have those in front of you as well.
As we go through the public art presentation there's only one slide that's different.
We just added a slide with some comparisons that we'll get to here momentarily.
So unless there's any other questions I will get started with the public art presentation.
So we've been, we've been, sure.
So that was item D right now, item D was our sidewalks and street lighting today.
We've, we've, we'll get to that point but we're looking to move that to next week just
to answer some additional questions.
So we've had public art and included in our, in the 2012 and 2014 bond elections.
Each one was handled slightly differently so I'll go through how they were handled differently
but to start with just kind of a history of where we are with these, with these, these
pieces of public art in the bond programs.
In the 2012 program we had $400,000 allocated for public art and that was all within transportation
as that whole bond, whole bond was the transportation proposition.
And you can see these are fundings that we've, that we've currently allocated to some projects
within this bond proposition.
These are not, we have not spent these.
Some of these we haven't even started yet but at least right now we have these allocated
for these individual projects.
These all go, as we talk through this, these all go through the public art committee so
they can make decisions to move some of this, recommend moving some of this funding around
to different projects.
But you can, you can see what these, what the, what the intent is with having transportation
dollars for public art.
And I have a couple pictures I can switch, as we go through the 2012 and 2014 I'll show
you two or three pictures of what these look like.
And just to point out we have issued the entire $400,000 from that 2012 program for public
art.
In 2014 obviously we had, we had multiple propositions so we had more dollars to spend.
We also changed our policy, which I'll get to in the next slide, where we didn't have
any money allocated for streets but we did have public art in both the public safety and
in the parks propositions.
So you can see $325,000 total allocated for public safety and $180,000 total to be allocated,
total allocated thus far for parks, but we also have an additional $30,000 that we'll
be issuing next year as we close out the 2014 bond program completely with our final bond
issuance.
$30,000 of that bond issuance will be for public art.
So one of the big pieces here in the public safety was the 9/11 Memorial Bell Tower, which
again, as that was a public safety, in the public safety proposition all these dollars
had to be spent on public safety.
They did not have to be spent on a project within the bond, but it did have to be spent
in the world of public safety essentially.
I'll quickly just flip over and show you some of these pictures from the past.
There's the 9/11 Memorial Bell Tower.
Here's one of the medallions that's out there on the streets and then another piece right
there.
I'll go forward and talk a little bit about the policy, but these are for reference and
I can definitely answer any additional questions as we talk through this.
So the difference that you saw in the 2012 and 2014 bond programs as far as the funding
that was available was really due to a change in our public art policy in 2013 ahead of
the 2014 bond election.
At that time, the city made a decision to essentially only have 2% to 4% now in the
policy, 2% at the time, of vertical construction go to public art, whereas in 2012, it was
the entire cost of the bond program and that was a streets bond, so there was no vertical
costs at that time.
But in the 2014 program, and which is still our current policy, it only relates to essentially
vertical construction, does not relate to streets cost.
So as we look to the 2019 program, the only dollars that would be allocated in our current
policy would be those dollars related to the public safety facilities.
It would not have any percentage off of the streets proposition.
Another piece, as you saw in 2012 and '14, those percentages for public art stayed in
the proposition that the dollars came from.
So if it was in parks or public safety, they stayed within that proposition, thus as it
went through the art committee and we looked for projects for those funds, they had to
be related to the proposition.
There is an option within our current policy that we could create a third proposition or
fourth proposition that's just public art, and you could take that total if you say you
want it to be 2%, take that total amount and have it be its own proposition.
But if we went that route, that would mean that the voters would vote on that proposition
separately.
It is an option.
As we go through some comparisons, you'll see there is at least one city in the comparisons
that chose to do it that way, but just want to make sure we lay out all the options for
everyone.
Obviously, the benefit of doing that would be you have more options to spend the dollars
on.
So here's a new slide, and this is just kind of a quick analysis of some of these cities
that we know have had bond elections recently and that we view as comparison cities to show
that public art really ranges quite different from city to city, you can really go a lot
of different directions with it.
In Frisco, they have 1% to 2% of funding, but it's not necessarily for the entire proposition.
They really go project by project, and they say if we're going to go 1% on this project,
then we'll spend it with the project itself.
Allen is the example that they had their own bond proposition in there, I believe 2016
bond program, where they said we're going to do 2% of our total without land acquisition,
take that amount, put it in a bond proposition, and then the voters end up voting for the
bond proposition.
Then those dollars became available more wide-ranging.
McKinney, they have a public art program, but they don't allocate dollars from bond
programs.
They allocate other funding sources for their public art program.
You can see some options here with Dallas and Fort Worth.
Dallas does a 1.5% of project funding, but those are within each proposition, and then
their funding has to be near the site of the project that the funding was allocated to.
In Fort Worth, 2%, and it's within each proposition, similar to how we've done in the past couple.
Sure.
Did Allen's bond pass?
Yes.
Yeah, that bond proposition passed.
Do we have any examples of bonds where it was separate, that separate piece did not
pass?
I have not seen any in the comparisons I've looked at, but we can definitely keep looking
and trying to find what would be ... It would be interesting.
I don't know how frequent that happens, but we'll keep searching and see if we see one
like that.
Here are the options that we have right now.
Based on the charge from the committee, from the council to the committee, the charge was
to consider our public art funding at 2% or less, less than vertical construction as laid
out in our policy to be included in the bond program.
Here's an estimate of what that would be for our ... Just looking at our public facilities
portion would be about $900,000, and that would, if we kept it in public safety, obviously
only could be used for public safety projects.
Public art policy does allow, as I mentioned, the standalone bond proposition, so based on
the charge, it's set to follow the policy, so that does remain an option in the charge
that was given to the committee.
As we talk through this with city council, they were open to the committee talking this
through and coming back and recommending changes to our policy that would allow different routes
for public art.
I will say with that option, we would want to move fairly quickly on something like that
so that we can get a new policy in place before we get to the end of July, and we're making
that recommendation to council, but that is something the council was open to, of coming
back with revisions to the art policy as recommended by the committee.
In order to ... Sorry, I'm figuring out how I phrase this, you said if they were included
with one or two propositions that were proposed with, then they would be restricted to be
used along with projects that are similar in nature, is that correct?
Projects that would fall, so if it's public safety facilities, it would just need to be
at a public safety facility.
If it was the committee's desire to offer public art funding for projects that were
not necessarily earmarked for that particular use, but could be used for other ways in the
city, would that have to be a third bond proposition then?
That would have to be a separate proposition.
That would allow that flexibility.
Correct.
Thank you.
I was trying to figure out who picks out the art.
We have a public art committee, which ultimately they'll be the ones who recommend what we
move forward with.
They meet regularly, and options are presented to them, or they suggest things that they'd
like to see, and then they'll make those recommendations on what they want to move forward with.
They really are driven by the public art policy and how the ordinance had created the committee,
so those are their charges essentially of how they review those projects as they come
up.
Okay.
If you see art or whatever, no artists, then you would just actually go through that committee
and present, "Hey, I really feel like," or the public can actually ...
Sure.
Yeah, they could come and artists could come and present, would be a realm for them to
do that, sure.
Thank you.
Okay.
Any other questions?
So we have two options, and it sounds like if we're going to go to anything other than
option one, we need to make a decision in some time in the next ...
I would say in the next couple of meetings, obviously most of the decisions as we go through,
we don't have to make formal decisions till the end, but again, given the time on this
one, if you want to maybe at the next couple of meetings bring this back up, and we can
revisit with everyone and see if everyone's on the same page with keeping the policy itself
or going somewhere different.
So a similar question.
Could we suggest that the 2% be part of the public safety proposition but not part of
the roadways proposition?
With the policy itself now, that is the way it's written.
It's by default.
By then.
Because that's the only vertical construction.
Oh, right, right, right.
Yeah.
Because it makes a lot more sense to be doing color and art around a facility than the road.
Yeah.
Okay, got it.
Thank you.
So does the cost of the remodel of the police department, would that be considered vertical
construction?
It is.
Yeah.
It is.
The way it's written, it doesn't say vertical construction.
It doesn't have to be.
It essentially says not streets and transportation.
Oh, street.
Okay.
It doesn't say that is vertical construction, but it would essentially be that entire proposition,
2% of it.
Any other thoughts?
All right.
Okay.
Let's move on to the next item, then.
Okay.
Gary Packin, Director of Parks and Recreation, here this evening to talk to you about parkland
acquisition.
The presentation agenda, obviously we're here for consideration of a potential bond program
for land acquisition for future park space.
We're going to go over some reasons for land acquisition for the Parks Department, discuss
available resources that we currently have and that are available to us, provide a prioritized
list of real estate considerations and what we look at when we're looking for land, as
well as how we prioritize land when we're looking at it, and then receive feedback from
the board itself.
Some reasons for land acquisition, obviously, is for future parkland, preserve open space
and tree canopy, and connectivity of our trails and city assets, schools, public spaces.
A combination of some of those or all of the above could be included.
Some current acquisition mechanisms we have, we have a 2014 bond program, we have a little
over a million dollars that is planned to be available next year.
A tree mitigation fund, it's a $2.2 million is our last balance.
That can be used for land acquisition.
We have used it for tree planting, primarily, on the past, so we're currently going through
an urban tree plan at the direction of council from last November to go through that and
see how the recommendations are, how that's going to be used.
So it can be used for land purchases.
Land acquisition fund, which we call our 915 fund, that's part of our land development
and acquisition ordinance, and that is funding that comes in from development for land purchase
where a developer can either give us land or give us fee in lieu of, and they can give
us funding that we can go out and use that to buy land.
The downside of that is that it's sprinkled all over the city.
There's not lump sums.
So it could be more of a supplement or an assistance to a larger purchase.
Obviously, partnerships with development schools and businesses are an opportunity as well.
We have two park projects that are working through development.
One at Razor Ranch and one in South Denton, which is currently called Patrick Park, where
the development is going on and they're providing land and developing the park for us.
So that's another way to acquire land.
Obviously, a donation.
We're working through one land donation right now in southeast Denton.
Advancement or conservation easements is an opportunity, and then just a general lease
of property for park space.
So over the past, I guess, six, seven months, we've been working a lot on trying to get
a number of things assembled for our department.
I had mentioned earlier that we're working on our urban forest plan at direction of council.
That's going to give us some groundwork on how we plan to enhance and maintain our urban
tree canopy, but as well as how we can get some guidance on using the tree mitigation
fund.
Our parks master plan is really the foundation for our entire park system that typically
is renewed every five years and completely redeveloped every 10.
It was updated in 2009, so we're going through a complete overhaul of our master plan, and
part of that is looking at land acquisition and land needs.
Adoption of a 10-minute walk.
This is really kind of the foundation of how we're identifying where we need land.
NRPA, National Parks and Recreation Association and Trust for Public Lands, launched this
in 2017, and this is a tool that's aiming towards getting park space within a 10-minute
walk of every resident in the United States or a half mile.
So that's how we're identifying where our population is and where we're a void of park
space and that connectivity.
In March, we started identifying potential park property, and we continue to do this,
and assembling that and going through a process that we created this spring as well, and we're
calling it a Parks Property Algorithm, and how we go through, we evaluate, we have a
scorecard for each property, and then we rank those based on various considerations.
So we can kind of figure out what's the higher priority for us.
A 10-minute walk, obviously, is a major one of those, Urban Tree Canopy is, and I have
a slide I'll show you about that here in a little bit.
And then we're currently going through a complete rewrite of our park land acquisition and development
ordinance that was written in 1998, has not been updated.
That is where the developers pay for park land and development, where they donate that
land and build the park for us.
Again, that hasn't been touched since 1998, so it's outdated, and it's really 1988 values
as well.
So we're pretty underserved in regards to the return on investment that we're getting
from that.
Overview of the city, I'm going to jump out of here and go into a GIS program that we
have, just to kind of give you an idea of how we're looking at this, and then I'll
get into some more details.
So this is obviously the city, green is park property, and purple is city property.
And when we turn on our 10-minute walk, you can see where we have that half-mile radius
around each park property, and where we're void of those parks.
Now you can see there's city land here, that doesn't count because it's not park land.
You can partner with private organizations that have public parks, HOAs can be accessible
if you have a shared-use agreement, as well as schools.
So we're developing a list of potential opportunities we have there.
But this just gives you a general sense in regards to where our parks are and where those
voids are.
You can see where neighborhoods are underserved.
And then also, I can turn on where there's development going on, and this is through
our development services group, where these yellow boxes are where some forms of development
are happening in the city.
So you can see there's a lot of yellow boxes here, and these are various forms, whether
it's construction of new buildings, renovations, anybody that's pulled a permit, or that's
under evaluation right now.
So we use this tool here, as well as to identify where there's developments that are coming
that are going to have to be paying into our park land development fund, where there's
potential resources coming, and where we may be able to get park land in partnership with
that development.
So, our service areas.
This is the impact areas for our street impact fees, and we're proposing to use the same
zones for our new ordinance that's being written.
So what we've done the next couple slides is we've narrowed down to each zone and provided
some additional details in regards to what type of activity from park space is in that
area, population, and some analysis according to that.
I'm going to jump back to the presentation here, and we can jump back to this if you
have any questions.
So these are the zones that we just showed you.
So zone A, and this is the southwest denton on the west side of 35.
It's 100 coal ranches are at major portions of that space, as well as the ropes and area.
There's 3,500 residents there, so it's very small.
There's significant land needs as development would, future would occur.
We currently have 17 acres.
There's two parcels down there.
They are undeveloped at this time.
So when you figure out the numbers, that's 4.7 acres per thousand residents.
That's below the standard for NRPA, and there's significant trail opportunities.
Obviously, with future development going over there, we have an opportunity to start fresh
and tie into our current trail system.
Gary, do you take into consideration any of the areas with the end ropes and ranch proper
that are park-like?
They would have to be joint.
The 27 holes?
Just asking.
Yes and no.
From a master plan standpoint, we would consider that, but those are private parks, and the
general public does not have access to that.
If we could get a joint use agreement for use of their pickleball courts on a regular
basis where the public can come and go, then that would be considered as part of our 10
minute walk.
So from a 10 minute walk standpoint, obviously, this is poor.
We don't have any trails out there.
There isn't a lot of residents, but from that standpoint, that's poor.
So impact zone B, and this is east of 35W, south of 35E, there's population is 42,000.
We're getting feedback from this area of the community that they want more.
At 35, the highway is really a barrier for access going north, just a mental barrier
and a physical barrier.
We do have a future southwest park, which is planned right in this area right here.
So that's 200 acres that's currently undeveloped.
There are no baseball fields on this side of town.
There's one soccer field.
So can you point to where Denia would be?
Denia is right here.
So we do have a rec center in this area, it's in the northern section.
There had been discussions, I guess, along the way once this property was purchased that
maybe a rec center, a future rec center, could go in that area.
We're going to be working on that master plan sometime later this year for that park.
So it's just north of Country Lake.
Yes, it's right by Allred and Vintage, between Allred and Vintage and Bonnie Bray.
So not all of the grand spaces are necessarily developed, it's just spaces that are currently
parkland.
Yes, ma'am.
We have nine undeveloped parks.
No, they're a little over.
So we have 636 acres.
With that amount of acreage in pretty much three large park areas, we're at 15.2 acres
and that is above the NRPA median for 1,000 residents.
Trail opportunity, even with the development that's going on there, there's still a significant
opportunity.
With some of the roads that are being rebuilt, we're working with other city departments
to make sure we include a 10-foot wide sidewalk or trail that could be shared use to get from
point A to point B along the roads and then try to tie in our park system at the same
time.
Is that land in the south part that's in between, or the undeveloped part, yeah, there.
Right here?
Yeah.
Is that available for acquisition?
Is there a reason they're not connected?
Yeah, there is.
Is there a creek through there?
This is the creek here.
Okay.
This is city property.
This is where the fire station is and a proposed police station.
And then this is park land.
This is privately owned at this time.
And they won't sell it?
We haven't talked to them about selling it, but that could be a discussion.
Are there environmental easements through there, like Hickory Creek?
ESAs?
Yeah.
I believe there are ESAs on the creek.
Yeah.
And they don't extend down any further, or they don't count as park land?
Yeah.
Some of this is in the floodplain where this area is not.
Gary, can you define what an ESA is, please?
Environmentally sensitive area.
And those don't count as park land?
We can have park land that is also an ESA, yes.
And you can have private land that is also an ESA.
Zone C, this is kind of the northwest Denton population, 12,585 people.
This is where the property, a park in Razor Ranch, is currently being developed.
We do, again, have still a significant need for land.
And while it's still low, potential future development in that area.
We do have 444 acres.
Most of that is North Lakes Park.
And that puts us at 35.29 acres, way above the NRPA median at that point for 1,000 residents.
A trail opportunity.
We haven't done enough research in that area, but I still think there's a tremendous opportunity
there.
We just haven't kind of forecasted that.
And then the 10-minute walk, we consider to be poor.
And the park going in Razor Ranch now is not on there, correct?
It's not on here yet.
It's located right up, right here, right at the tip of the arrow.
It's just shy of 10 acres.
And it's located in the middle of apartment complex, mixed-use development, right there
by Albertsons.
And that's McKenna Park?
McKenna Park is the square, yeah, right here.
And this is Bonnie Bray.
Some of that area is not residential.
It's not going to be residential.
It's zoned, partial or industrial.
So, there's not, we're not looking at that piece of gray and saying, okay, all that's
going to be houses or apartments.
There's a number of apartments around it, and then there's some residential too, between
the park and Bonnie Bray, and everything primarily to the west is the commercial space.
Zone D, this is kind of northeast Denton, population a little less than 17,000.
We have identified a number of opportunities for trails in this area.
From a rec center standpoint, there is not a rec center.
We are, as part of our master plan, looking if we could not maybe add on to an auditorium
in the future and make that a rec center as well as opposed to just a swim facility.
So that's an opportunity for consideration for the community.
There's no dedicated athletic space other than the competitive pool.
We do have 65 acres there, 3.89, that is below the NRPA standard.
A trail opportunity, again, we've identified a number of opportunities for trails up there,
especially as roads are developed.
And then from a 10-minute walk, with most of our parks in the lower left quadrant of
that sector, we consider that poor as well.
So that's Nevy Schultz and Avondale there in the bottom?
Right in here.
And this is Cooper Creek.
Right.
And what's the pink and yellow?
This pink here?
This is the city limits, and this is the ETJ.
We're concerned with parkland in the ETJ, or are we?
Eventually, that will be turned over to the city.
That will become city land in 2021?
It's not right now.
It's not right now?
They all have different timeframes.
Different timeframes?
Okay.
Is the ETJ playing into our calculations of acres per whatever?
Right now, our formula, I believe, is just pulling off of the city, not the ETJ.
Okay.
That's a good question.
I need to double-check that.
What's the purple right now?
It's a city on them, but is there anything there, or is it just land?
So this piece right here?
This property was purchased for a future wastewater treatment plant.
I think currently, they decided that that's not needed, that there's going to be a pump
station there.
So that, we have had some discussions with the wastewater department utilities about
potentially putting some park space in there.
Some of the smaller ones are substations for DME.
Yeah.
Various city land.
Cooper Creek Trail?
Yeah.
No.
Sorry.
Clear Creek.
Thank you very much.
Yeah.
Clear Creek is basically all of this right here.
Okay.
And I can jump on the map and show you that.
And that isn't included in the city parks because that's core property, right?
It is core property.
It's managed by our environmental group.
We are not including that in some of our details because 2,000 acres of wood is raised, 25
acres.
It throws our numbers way off.
It creates a little bit of confusion numerically.
So we don't include that in our neighborhood parks, our general park system.
So you have a committee for this?
For land acquisition?
Yes.
Well, anything that we buy, we would work with parks department or parks board as well
as city council.
Okay.
For eventual approval.
And then zone E, this is obviously the area that we're in right now.
It's the most densely populated, 63,000 people.
As we're doing our master plan, we have North Lakes and South Lakes and then eventually
Southwest Park.
And we're considering those based on their size as city parks.
And so we're looking at potentially an East and West Lakes Park.
So we kind of have a ring of city parks and those are typically 100 acres or more that
would have more services in them.
So this is a potential location for that.
We do have 183 acres in this zone.
They're fairly smaller size parks at 2.87 acres, which is well below the median based
on the population and the density.
Again, trail opportunity with the number of small parks.
We have plotted out some locations for connectivity, which I'll show you here in a second for trails
in the future.
And then our 10 minute walk to consider this good.
Gary, sorry, can you orient us?
So this is Quaker Town right here.
This is where we're at.
Anything on the far left is McKenna?
This is McKenna.
This is Mack Park over here.
And this is the landfill to give you an idea of the giant purple wall.
And I just mentioned about connectivity.
This was one of the first areas that we started to research and we're calling it Pecan Creek
Linear Trail where we're taking and we're following the creek itself in many areas and
we're trying to connect city assets, future development, city property, city parks, and
then eventually maybe even the Army Corps of Engineers property.
So to give you an idea, this is Fredmore Park here.
The Katy Trail runs parallel kind of up into this area here.
We could go from the Katy Trail through Fredmore across the street, through some city property
here across the drainage creek into Carl Young.
This purple is the county jail property, working to get an easement potentially from them.
Into city property, we have to get across Woodrow and then into this property, which
is city property, and then eventually a development that we've had discussions to that would connect
all of that as well as to Mack and those parcels.
And then take us over to Pebblebrook Creek, which is a city undeveloped area.
And then this is the landfill.
So we'd work our way probably on the north side of the creek, of the landfill, and then
that connects into the Army Corps of Engineers so that could take us down to the lake.
So we would have a trail eventually in some form or fashion.
It's a long-term plan.
How many miles would that be?
I haven't measured that yet because it would be obviously a guesstimate, but we haven't
done that yet.
So we're looking at areas like this throughout the city, whether it's adjacent to the street
on a 10-foot trail or completely off-road along creeks, which is an easier path because
typically it's in the floodplain and you can't develop there.
So it gives us that opportunity to put a trail through there.
So some of the considerations when we're looking at land, we have 18, 20 different ones here.
Our three main ones right now are our 10-minute walk that allows us to identify where we have
vacancies and we're underserving our tree canopy and trying to preserve our trees.
And then connectivity of our assets.
There's other things, whether it's culture or history, wildlife, habitat, corridors,
the location itself, how can we assist economic development, stormwater management.
Funding sources obviously help drive that where we may have 915 money, helps identify
that because that's kind of landlocked funding.
The quality and species of trees, underserved areas, and then any way we can achieve any
other city goal.
Quality costs and beautification are major factors as well and it could be something
that's waterfront, could be lakefront, it could be topography where there's some undulation
in the land where it's unique features for the city are all factors that we look at.
So we started this back in the spring and we really didn't have a way to look at land
and figure out how we feel it's better than another piece of land, other than just kind
of a gut feeling.
So we created all those considerations and created a scorecard.
So we have a little evaluation sheet we go through and we score each parcel in regards
to its tree canopy, its location, its cost, its unique features, all of that.
And then we look at DCAD value, its DCAD value per acre, its total acre opportunity, the
percent of trees on the property, if we can have open space as well as preserved trees,
uniqueness of those trees, 10 minute walk and those other sources and we figure out
how we're going to rank those and we prioritize those.
So what we did with this scenario is we had a list of 35, 40 properties, we went through
and scored them and then we highlighted the top, I think it was the top 10, what you see
in green and then we added all the top 10s together just to kind of see what would surface
to the top, kind of what was the cream of the crop to identify where we may want to
look at land.
So that's how we kind of came up with a prioritization process.
It's not perfect but it's better than what we had before which was really nothing.
It was just kind of a gut feeling.
So at least this gave us some direction on how to focus our time and prioritize how we're
going to approach future land acquisition.
So I have two slides here.
Our PA has what they call park metrics and parks and recreation departments across the
country submit all their demographics, all their budgets, their park land, all their
features and the assets they have so they can use all the information and then share
it amongst everybody so you can kind of see how you can pair and rank with other departments
of similar size, demographics, land, government entity, etc.
And so we've been working on analyzing that for this process.
And the one thing that we've looked at is our developed and undeveloped land which from
a park standpoint we have basically 1500 acres that does not include the 2500 at Clear Creek.
It does not include right-of-ways and medians as well.
So we first looked at our population of cities in the country of 100,249,000.
And then we took three considerations for the bond amount of $5, $10, and $15 million
at an average cost of $80,000 an acre and obviously that can fluctuate based on time
the bonds are sold to where the property is and what's going on around it.
And that would equate to about 62 acres if we did a $5 million bond program.
We currently have 14, I would say 1500 acres.
Based on our current standard with a population of 136,000 people we actually have a surplus
of a little over 300 acres based on this formula.
If you look on 2025 with an average growth of 171,000 we're at 98 acres so that starts
to shrink a little bit assuming we're not buying any land other than the 62 acres that
would be bond program.
And then at 2030, our 2030 plan projects of 207,000 people.
We're now at a deficit of 203 acres.
Now this is the average.
This is the average city in the United States based on parkland.
That's not the upper quartile or trying to excel past that.
That's just being the average as a plateau.
And then the same goes on with 10 and 15 million.
You can see how it progresses.
So the green is positive and the red is negative scores.
So for the most part based off of population we're in good shape.
This is one of nine categories that NRPA has for us to look at in regards to land and acreage.
So what we did is we took all nine categories and figured out the average acre per thousand
and we came up with the same scenario but if you look at this in 2020 we're currently
40 acres in a deficit and again this is average.
This isn't you know being in a higher quartile of municipalities.
And in 2025 we're 377 short and 2030 we're 778 short.
Again that's only accounting for no other land purchases other than the 62 acres that's
shown here that would be part of that initiative.
Now there's a number of ways that we could split the apple on this.
If you look at this first slide in regards to the population it looks good.
And this could be our metric if that's what we want to do.
But we wanted to show you both options.
Good shape here.
This is the highest ranking category for us in regards to land and then this is the average
of all nine of the categories and those nine categories down here are all cities, population,
budget size, acres maintained, FTEs, number of parks maintained, population per square
mile, the jurisdiction whether it's a city county or a private park district and then
region for southern or southwest U.S.
So there's numerous ways to look at the numbers.
And we wanted to provide kind of more than one way to kind of look at this.
So that's the presentation.
I'm not sure I understand this one, if we're investing $15 million why wouldn't it make
a bigger dent in 2020, wasn't it supposed to be?
This assumes that land wouldn't be purchased in 2020.
So this category here is our current $1496.
Got it.
So then if we added $187.5, got it.
So we're adding and then we're losing a little bit because the population is going up.
So did you run it with one, two, three, four, five, I mean I'm wondering if there's one
metric in there that's kicking us down low or is there anything that we.
Sensitivity analysis.
Yes, so we didn't run it for each one.
This one here for the population was the one that we were the best in and that's why you
see a lot of that green.
The other ones were five acres off per thousand so that's dragging us down a little bit when
you look at that category.
But ultimately we just need to figure out what's the category we really want to classify
ourselves at and we thought this one was kind of one of the better ones.
Gary, Diana?
Hi.
Do we have an overlay of the development plan and the little green spaces?
We do actually.
I can jump back to this.
So let me turn some things off here.
Okay, so again I'll make this a little bit bigger, I'll zoom in here in a second.
The green is parks and the purple is city.
When you turn into what we did is we took the map that development services has that
has all of their projects that are in the works whether it's permitting, construction,
whatever that is and we overlaid that so that's the yellow that you're seeing.
Those are various forms of development consideration.
So that gives you an idea of kind of what's going on in the city.
Sure.
The wildlife person is going to ask this question, right?
Is there an overlay that shows where the ESA's are?
Have they been identified?
We do have, I don't have the ESA overlay on this but we can put that together.
Okay.
That is available on the city's website too.
There's an interactive map that's online.
Awesome.
Okay.
Have we thought about partnering with, I was the one with the Veterans Village, we partnered
with UNT with that one.
Is there the possibility of partnering with them, they own a lot of land?
UNT?
There's, whether it's a school or a university or a private sector that has land that's not
going to be developed that maybe is underutilized, we could definitely approach that for consideration
especially if there's an area that we need to put a creek or a trail through an area
that's on a linear trail.
We could get an easement from them to help us go through there so there's more than one
way to peel the orange I guess, and we're trying to utilize all those opportunities
to build our park system.
One last, the wildlife corridors, are we anticipating them going under or somehow going west to
east or are we only looking at north-south?
Well the interstates are big challenges.
And that's going to take a little more work.
We're trying to figure out how to put trails across those or underneath those when roads
are built.
There are one or two, I know there's one area on 35W that is a Corbin, could be an opportunity
to get underneath there for trail connectivity.
Everything else is more or less along the roadside.
On the 9/15 funding, I think that may have come out of the dog park discussion, so if
you get money from the developer, how far away can you spend the money distance-wise?
It starts out at a half mile and it can go up to a mile.
I can turn on, so one of the things we worked on this past year is identifying where that
funding is exactly located.
So all the blue dots are where our 9/15 funding is, where that's available for land acquisition.
So you're really limited on that space.
When we go through the redevelopment of the ordinance, we're hoping to switch to the
quadrants that we showed earlier so that money can be spent in one of those five geographic
locations that now open up a little more flexibility with funding.
But we still have some work to do on that.
Any other questions?
Is condemnation available to the Parks Department for acquiring land?
I guess it's an opportunity, but I don't think that's something that we'd want to consider.
Sorry, you mentioned the trails and connectivity and that sort of thing several times.
I noticed on the county long-term plan that they had identified some sort of a co-easement
trail along the Union Pacific Railroad that would go under 35E.
Is that something you're looking at and would that require additional purchases from the
Parks Department or is that something that would be handled by other departments?
So let me see if I can turn this on, giving me fits here.
So we are, this is all conceptual at this point in time.
If I can find it, city trails, trails to trails, potential trails, here it is.
So this is that trail that you're talking about.
I was actually talking about the southern portion of that if you continue down the railway
to connect.
Oh, going this way down 377.
And between those two pieces, right?
Right now there's a pretty heavily densely populated area between Fort Worth and Dallas
Drive that has that railway going straight through it and it could be interesting if
that could get you under 35 to be able to.
So you're talking right here?
Yeah.
We can look at that.
I haven't explored that.
We've looked at Mingo as a way to get from downtown up to Clear Creek which would basically
get you from Dallas to downtown Denton to Lake Ray Roberts and then along the Katy Trail
or the DCTA corridor.
But some of these is Bonnie Bray and how we could connect Bonnie Bray from Discovery Center
all the way down to the new Southwest Park.
And then I can also turn on the bike layers.
It has the bike, the road, trails for bikes and we can also use that as some connectivity
opportunities.
Okay.
Yeah, I was just thinking of it in context of there's already a 35-B overpass over that
railway, right?
And so if there's enough easement or can be some fencing so that we could safely have
a pedestrian bicycle connection under there, that would give an opportunity.
There's also some significant electrical easement and lines over there rendering that property
really not...
Yeah, that's another good way to try to get accesses through existing utility easements.
Okay.
Any other questions or comments?
All right.
Thank you, Gary.
Thank you.
Very informative.
Next, we'll talk about sidewalks and street lights and the question is, for the group,
do we want to table that for next week or are there any questions that you'd like to
at least offer up now that David can capture and then be prepared next week to respond
to?
For lighting.
Pardon me?
For lighting.
For lighting and sidewalks, yes.
Something that we can ask staff to go research?
Right.
Yes.
I would like to know the lighting on Mayhill.
I'd like to see the lighting on Mayhill.
Okay.
I would like to know the crime stats for accidents, of course, after hours more than during the
working day.
For just Mayhill or all of them?
For right now.
Okay.
Right now until we have a list of the priorities that have been set forth for lighting.
Okay.
Does that make sense to you, David?
Sure.
We need to incorporate that.
All right.
Any other questions?
So if everyone's in agreement, we'll table any other discussion on sidewalks and lighting
until next week.
All right.
Very good.
Thank you.
All right.
Well, I think are there any other comments, questions, concerns that we need to discuss?
Pat, just a question that I'm not as experienced about how these things go, but given the schedule
that was shared about the need potentially for going back to council to get an amended
art policy within the next two weeks, does it make sense to spend a little bit of time
sharing some opinions on that so that we know if we need to address that in the next couple
weeks?
Sure.
We could do that.
I think it'd be more helpful to put that on the agenda for next week so everyone has an
equal opportunity to come prepared to do that.
Sounds great.
Thank you.
All right.
We can definitely put public art on next week, and I'll just use that as an opportunity
to say a thought process right now for next week would be public art, talk about streets
and street lighting and sidewalks, and then also use that opportunity to any of the outstanding
questions that we've had from any of the presentations from Public Safety or from the streets, either
through memo or through maybe a revised presentation, just bring those back as well so that hopefully
by next week we get to that point where we've looked at everything that is being presented
so far, and then use the following meetings as more follow-up, and then pointing to July,
start scheduling some public meetings where we invite the public to give comment.
So David, in the first meeting we asked for a list of the areas being considered for street
lights and sidewalks.
Is that in this book, or so that people could go visit that on their own, does that ring
a bell?
Sure.
So obviously within the presentation we gave previously you have that material where we
go into that to some degree, and then within each of the sections on the street lighting
section and the sidewalk section you're going to have some of that information as well.
And we'll obviously go into more detail next week, but you'll be able to find that in the
book.
Okay.
Janet?
So we had a very interesting presentation from Parks, but I'm not sure how that relates
to the city council.
I'm not sure how that relates to the city council.
When you go and repair streets, concrete streets, and you tear up the curves, I've seen some
where they replace the concrete curves with black asphalt.
Like Hillcrest, as an example.
Do you have plans to come back and put the concrete there, or is that a temporary or
a permanent?
What's going on there?
It's generally meant to be temporary, but I will definitely defer that one to Todd and
I'll come back and do that next week with the rash allies for that.
Typically, you'll replace it in kind.
The other thing that you're seeing neighborhoods ask about the sidewalk question is lately staffs
had a couple projects where they're designing very small like lifts on the road in lieu
of the curb and gutter to hold the roads in place a little bit more.
That's another thing that's starting to pop up more and more in the engineering just to
give that road a little more structural integrity.
But the sidewalk issue, while a lot of people like having those around, their neighborhoods
want nothing to do with them.
So we will tend to work with them on what they want.
So do we need to like on some of the neighborhoods that do want sidewalks, do we need to get
a list of the owners?
Yeah.
We'll typically go in and we'll do the pre-designed meetings and where we can get those sidewalks
slid in if we know where they are and we've got petitions.
That's what really helps us is when we have a neighborhood come to us with a petition
saying we know that we're on the road list, we'd like a sidewalk in place, we just need
to get those so we can budget them in as soon as we can.
We always try to accommodate those neighborhoods that do that.
Any other questions?
All right.
Can I take a motion for adjournment?
So moved.
All right.
Do you get that Madam Secretary, Patty, and then Diana.
All right.
Have a good evening.
Thank you.